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Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

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Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#861

Post by jandrese »

crazygringo wrote: post #856
jandrese wrote: post #841

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is still very much not my experiance. I ride on the roads a bit and usually cars are fine, although there are people with aftermarket lights and people who just leave high beams on all the time in heavy traffic. But I've experienced riding down the road with oncoming traffic in the other direction and doing just fine until a bicycle comes and blinds me just like the high intensity high beam guys. They are genera…

Fascinating. I'm honestly quite confused -- most of the bike headlights I see simply run on 2-3 AA or AAA batteries, and it doesn't seem physically possible for them to output the kind of bright light you're talking about. I personally am very careful to angle them downwards, because the entire point is to illuminate the ground in front of me -- if I'm shining in people's eyes, then it's not illuminating the ground.…

You apparently have a bunch of old stock incandescent AA powered bike lights in your area? Around here it's all LiPo or LiFe+ powered LEDs that easily put out 1,000 lumens (not an exaggeration).

Stuff like this:

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=bike+headlight

You can even see people posting pictures of the light where it's clearly illuminating 10' up the tree on the side of the path.

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61a2EhfJeeL.jpg

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#862

Post by mrguyorama »

cogman10 wrote: post #551
LTL_FTC wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. People just crank up the brightness on the inside lights because "blinky lights" but I have also noticed that, modern cars typically include fog lights which used to be a luxury or premium option, many people just drive around with these lights on as well. Fog lights are illuminating the area closer to the vehicle and therefore inhibit one's visibility further down the road. So now we get super bright veh…

Trucks are the absolute worst vehicles on the road. Their giant ass lights blind anyone near their vehicles. A number of truck owners, especially the ones that lift their vehicles, will additionally add light bars to the exterior which are so incredibly dangerous. We don't just need DOTs to set regulations on these things, we need cops to actually write tickets for this behavior and for judges to get confirmation tha…

The problem is largely that the same Cops who should be writing the tickets are the very people putting criminal light bars on their lifted pavement princess trucks.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#863

Post by mrguyorama »

bArray wrote: post #814
tetris11 wrote: post #503

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd wager it has more to do with ageing population than car accidents caused by non-native driver licenses.

In my personal experience, ageing drivers drive too slowly, but they are generally safe. They will often stop driving when they feel it is no longer safe, and almost all older drivers I know refuse to drive at night. Whether it is ageing or non-native licenses, I think a case can be made for checking that people conform with local expectations for driving skill.

>In my personal experience, ageing drivers drive too slowly, but they are generally safe.

Your "personal experience" is just wrong. They are driving slower because they cannot react fast enough to be safe. It is well understood that old drivers are dangerous, including the ones going 20mph in a 45mph zone.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#864

Post by mrguyorama »

sokoloff wrote: post #429
eszed wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only one I've experienced (Massachusetts) wouldn't catch any of what we're discussing in this thread. They put it on the emission testing machine, walked once around the car, maybe checked the brakes, and that was it. It was in no way comparable to the UK's MOT test, which is a proper inspection.

Headlight function (including aim) is on the MA vehicle inspection: https://www.mavehiclecheck.com/motorists-basicinfo Whether it’s done carefully or not, I doubt, though I did fail one year for headlight lenses too cloudy, requiring a fix and reinspection.

Maine also requires headlight aiming to be checked and compliant.

It's just not done though. There's a list of like 10 items to check, and you are only allowed to charge like $12-$18 for the check, so corners are cut, and your average 18 year old who was given the job of doing the inspection does not care, and enforcement is more concerned with the shops willing to give you a sticker for stuff that is outright criminal, like not really working brakes.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#865

Post by crazygringo »

jandrese wrote: post #861
crazygringo wrote: post #856

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fascinating. I'm honestly quite confused -- most of the bike headlights I see simply run on 2-3 AA or AAA batteries, and it doesn't seem physically possible for them to output the kind of bright light you're talking about. I personally am very careful to angle them downwards, because the entire point is to illuminate the ground in front of me -- if I'm shining in people's eyes, then it's not illuminating the ground.…

You apparently have a bunch of old stock incandescent AA powered bike lights in your area? Around here it's all LiPo or LiFe+ powered LEDs that easily put out 1,000 lumens (not an exaggeration). Stuff like this: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=bike+headlight You can even see people posting pictures of the light where it's clearly illuminating 10' up the tree on the side of the path. https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61a…

Not incandescent, it's still LED. I mean I don't know what percentage of riders have switched from the AA to rechargeable lithium batteries, or how much more current rechargeable lithium batteries provide.

I'll start paying more attention -- I'm curious now -- but I can still definitely say I've never felt blinded by a bicycle, or even close.

And the lights in that photo seem fine -- the road is pitch black just 20 feet in front. The tree is getting a lot of light reflected from the road and grass. The lights don't seem to be illuminating anywhere even close to as far as car headlights illuminate. None of that looks anything like what car headlights produce.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#866

Post by webnrrd2k »

saltcured wrote: post #854
XCabbage wrote: post #806

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume you're an American? As a Brit, your comment confuses me. Why would anyone ever have high beams on at all in anything reasonably described as a "neighbourhood"? Do built-up areas in the US not reliably have street lighting? Here in the UK, it is pretty much universally the case that if there are buildings, there are street lights. (Maybe there are occasional exceptions where there's a single building in the m…

I'm not the one you asked, but I think a lot of 'wealthy' neighborhoods in the US mean suburbia with larger single-family-home lots, and roads often feel a bit more rural. In my area in California, these are often unincorporated (county) lands just outside larger towns. You sometimes see a very clear boundary. The more middle-class housing is subdivisions built all at once somewhere in the 1960s-2000s, with undergrou…

Yes, exactly, very well explained.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#867

Post by oxag3n »

MichaelBurjack wrote: post #640
pipes wrote: post #619

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question (as in not a passive aggressive question!) why do you and your friends child mask?

Not sure why you'd ask me that vs. use Google, feels like cornering a random driver to defend "Why do you use seatbelts?". But I'll offer one reply at your word that it's genuine and not passive-aggressive. 1. I am currently dealing with the after-effects of a previous Covid infection that requires expensive, ongoing medical treatment. I'm not anxious to test what additional infections may cause. 2. Wearing an N95 re…

It's nice to see that my family is not alone in taking these precautions.

However as with the bright headlamps, there's no real solution coming anytime soon. I mean there are solutions - nasal vaccines and proper NHTSA regulation, but I have no hope in any of those to materialize.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#868

Post by mrguyorama »

macNchz wrote: post #166
everdrive wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in the woods in the northeast US, and also grew up in the 80s-90s in a very rural area and I've owned a number of cars when I was young, some with comically dim lights. You really don't need the bright lights. You never have. Slow down, look for movement, and use your brights intelligently.

Growing up in rural New England it seemed that people were constantly hitting deer with their cars—slowing down is obviously a good idea, but every additional foot of headlight distance certainly helps for spotting the glint of an eyeball on the side of the road.

Yes, those people were driving too fast.

>every additional foot of headlight distance certainly helps for spotting the glint of an eyeball on the side of the road.

Only if you are paying attention in the first place. The reality is that most people hitting deer and moose just are not, or the animal ran out in front of them and there was nothing that could have been done.

I dodged many a moose with half burned out incandescent bulbs in shitty sedans in the northest of rural new england.

Meanwhile the silly folks who have duct taped ten massive LED lightbars to their fenders still seem to be hitting moose up north, so I just don't buy the "I need more light" argument.

https://www.mainepublic.org/environment-and-outdoors/2018-09...

Note how the DOT doesn't call out vehicle changes. Note also that despite the raw number being only a few thousand moose hits over a decade, you will consistently find that someone who has hit one moose is much more likely to have hit multiple moose.

They just aren't attentive drivers. Every single person up north has almost hit a moose. Only some of them routinely keep hitting moose. They are being saved by moose population control.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#869

Post by ash_091 »

pipes wrote: post #614
ash_091 wrote: post #560

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The recommended 3 second gap is a much bigger distance than most people recognise, especially at high speed. On another note- I feel sad that you could tell your mate "the way you're driving is making me uncomfortable" and be met with basically "your discomfort isn't valid because [technology] so I won't change my behaviour".

Yes on your last point, I feel exactly the same way. If anyone told me I was driving too fast and they were uncomfortable I'd immediately be apologetic and slow down, and I'd genuinely feel bad about it. As I get older I've realised that most people in my life react negatively if I express emotion that what they are doing is upsetting. It is only recently that I've realised my sample size is small and this kind of ga…

> most people in my life react negatively if I express emotion that what they are doing is upsetting

Right. I guess they feel accused, as though you're attacking their behaviour rather than sharing how it makes you feel, and instinctively become defensive in response?

It's wonderful to meet people who don't think this way. My partner is incredible at this, I can tell her "when you X I feel Y" and know without a doubt her reaction will come from a place of trying to work together to understand whether the problem and solution exist in X, Y or both.

Re: Nearly all UK drivers say headlights are too bright

#870

Post by rconti »

Wistar wrote: post #324
njarboe wrote: post #147

One of the main reasons people want/need brighter headlights is that there is much more light inside the car from screens. These don't let your eyes adjust to the dark properly. Older cars had dim green lighting for the gauges and even had a knob to adjust the brightness up and down. You could create a very dim interior instead of the huge amount of white light you get with modern cars and the multiple screens. I'm h…

Lately, I see a lot of drivers who turn on their brights and just leave them on and this includes cars with the older halogen and even incandescents. This is a change in behavior. As for LEDs, to me, the Tesla Model 3 headlights are the worst offender, but not all of them, just the majority. I can look down a column of oncoming cars and pick out the Model 3s from a few blocks distance. I suspect that the Model 3 head…

> I suspect that the Model 3 headlights are often maladjusted as they have a user/driver-accessible headlight aiming menu and it looks to me like a lot of Tesla owners get in to that menu and do some freelance aiming.

There's just no way that more than 0.5% of drivers of any model are going to this level of tinkering. I have a Model 3, and I've never seen that menu. And I post here!

One contributing factor to people noticing "the blue light means you're blinding people" is that it's just a blue light outline on an already blinding white dash screen (and in the case of the tesla, an OFFSET dash screen).

"Back in my day", the blue high beam light was the brightest damn thing on the cluster, so you KNEW when your brights were on. Now you have to _look_ for the indicator.

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